5 Things we learned from Barcelona’s comfortable win over Athletic Club
efoWell that was easier than I thought it would be. On paper I thought this was actually going to be quite a tough game for Barcelona with Athletic Club fielding their strongest 11 with players like Nico Williams, Unai Simon, Aymeric Laporte, Oihan Sancet etc but Hansi Flick’s side were by far the better team and should have won by 4 or 5 if it wasn’t for some heroics from Unai Simon in the net for Athletic Club. Barca looked the stronger side immediately in the first half with Raphinha hitting the post, Yamal forcing a brilliant save from Simon along with Pedri having a goal ruled out for a tight offside in the opening 30 minutes, Barca did eventually open the scoring in the 36th minute after Pedri made a driving run through the midfield before playing a genius pass through to Raphinha who rounded the keeper and slotted into an empty net. They did have a chance to double their lead just minutes later as Marc Bernal won the ball high up before playing Yamal through on goal who forced a miraculous save from Unai Simon to keep the score at just 1-0 heading into half-time, Barca upped the tempo even more in the second half pinning Athletic Club back but couldn’t find that second goal with Yamal hitting the crossbar and Unai Simon making save after save to keep te score at 1-0. Athletic Club did have one chance in the second half with Oihan Sancet hitting the post from just outside the box with a brilliant effort but Barca did eventually get the second just minutes later as Adeyemi played a low ball into the box which Laporte tried to play back to Unai Simon but misplaced the pass straight into the path of Fermin Lopez who put the game to bed in the 81st minute, a pretty straightforward win in the end for the La Liga holders.
Barcelona still the team to beat in La Liga. Hansi Flick’s team won 19 out of 19 home games in La Liga last year and that record was in place for a reason, this team is basically unstoppable going forward. The score might say 2-0 but without a World Cup winning goalkeeper in the net Athletic Club would have conceded 4, 5 or 6 tonight, Raphinha has been a revelation in that false-9 position so far this season which makes me wonder if Barcelona still need to spend big on a striker before the end of the window. Pedri came back into the lineup and immediately levels up this Barcelona side providing a ridiculous assist to Raphinha for the opening goal, alongside Marc Bernal today who again impressed me so much in that midfield. There’ll be differing opinions on Lamine Yamal’s performance today but I thought in the second half he looked right back to his best absolutely torturing Louisjean at left-back, on another day Yamal would have esaily racked up a couple of goals and assists but no doubt that will come over the next few weeks. On paper the Barcelona defence looks like it has cracks all over it but they work unbelievably well as a unit and gave Athletic Club virually nothing all game barring the chance that hit the post which probably would have ruled out for a foul anyway, the Barcelona team tonight had 9 Spanish players in the starting 11 with most of them coming from La Masia so they know how to get the job done with Hansi Flick’s high-line which they are more than used too at this point. Overall another really impressive game from Barcelona who are just going from strength to strength under Hansi Flick, it’s hard to see anyone taking La Liga off them this year.
Edin Terzic hasn’t had the greatest start as Athletic Club manager. Having lost the opening game of the season to Sevilla 1-3 at home albeit with an early red card it was important that they bounced back with a better performance today but I thought Athletic Club were awful today, on paper you look at the likes of the Williams brothers, Sancet, Guruzeta etc and you think they could do some damage to that Barca back-line but any time they got some space going forward they made the wrong decision each and every time. I’m a big fan of Nico Williams in particular but he put in a shameful performance today and I’m suprised it took Terzic 60 minutes to take him off, up against a young, inexperienced full-back in Xaxi Espart you’d think he’d get some joy but the Barca full-back locked him up and threw away the key for 60 minutes. Defensively you can say the same apart from Unai Simon who stopped the score getting embarassing for Athletic Club, Laporte has been linked with Barca throughout this window but you wouldn’t be going near him after a performance like tonight. Overall it’s been a pretty disastrous start to the season for Edin Terzic and Athletic Club but you’d back him to turn it around sooner rather than later, they have a trip to Celta Vigo next on Sunday.
Can a pivot of Rodri and Pedri keep Barcelona competing for major trophies? We saw Rodri make his debut tonight for Barcelona and whilst you might think it’s a silly question to ask I think it has more substance than you think, the World Cup is a perfect example where Pedri was dropped from the Round Of 16 onwards for Fabian Ruiz following a pretty poor first few games in the tournament so it has me wondering if it’s all going to be sunshine and rainbows in that midfield for Barcelona. I am a massive fan of Marc Bernal for a plethora of reasons but one of the main ones is how well he works with Pedri in Barca’s midfield which we saw a number of times last season as well as today, I think it’s a massive shame that undoubtedly he is going to get less minutes now that Rodri has come in and will probably start most games in there. Pedri has always been the player that makes Barca tick on the ball but with Rodri now in there will he have to change his game and be content with less touches of the ball? He’ll definitely have to improve going forward and I think we’ve seen improvements over the last year in that department but I’m not completely sold that Barcelona needed Rodri in that midfield over a centre-back or striker. I could very well be wrong but that’s just my opinion, only time will tell.
Any more business to do before the window ends? Over the last week all we’ve heard regarding Barcelona’s transfer activity is that they want Julian Alvarez in the door but Atletico Madrid are completely blocking the deal and won’t accept any bid Barca offer, Alvarez wants to join Barca and has made that pretty clear to just about everyone but Atleti won’t sell him to a rival so maybe we could see him go elsewhere possibly Arsenal? With Raphinha’s rebirth as a striker maybe they could look to a cheaper alternative but I’ve not seen any links so of tonight so we might have to wait a few days, I still think they need a centre-back as well but again I’m not sure who that could be. Definitely not Laporte after what I saw tonight, it’ll be interesting to see how Barca look once the transfer window ends on Tuesday. Will they get a striker and centre-back before it closes? I really don’t know.